Rev. Alejandro Flores was accused of sexually abusing a 13-year-old boy a few days ago. The Catholic church removed Flores as vicar of Holy Family Church in Shorewood. They also removed his priestly faculties and moved him to neutral housing. The diocese contacted the Department of Children and Family Services. Flores decided to attempt suicide. He failed.
Flores was taken to a diocese residence on Center Street where he would be kept from contact with children and "closely monitored."
"That was something we volunteered to do based on the serious nature of the allegations," Sartain said, when asked if anything in Flores' statements or behavior indicated he needed to be monitored.
The press calls it a “Balcony fall”. I think “Balcony fail” is closer to the truth.
Police reports indicate a responding officer walked up to the balcony while firefighters were treating the injured priest and found "a jacket, cell phone, glasses, large knife and a bottle of liquor" there. Those items were processed by an evidence technician.
It’s such a sad story. After reading it, I found some hope in that they acted swiftly to protect the child and did what they were supposed to do with regard to legal reporting. My hopes were dashed by the article’s comments. Citizen55 posted the following tripe. I call it the typical “what about the pedophile” speech.
Bishop Sartain seems to be more concerned about how to spin this with the media. But what did he do for Fr. Alex ? Did they even bother to council him or try to evaluate his mental and emotional state after they just took everything away from him ? I doubt it. Regardless of the accusations made against him Fr. Alex deserved better treatment than what this Bishop laid on him. It is shameful and disgusting from what I have seen the last few days from the Joliet Diocese on this and the Bishop also needs to personally apologoze to the people of Holy Family Parish for the way in which Fr. Alex was treated
I guess they could have locked up Fr. Alex and kept him on some kind of suicide watch. Of course, that assumes some level of guilt. I don’t know if that fair.
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